A new research project aims to reduce the impact of CO2 emissions on the environment by investigating the role of sustainable procurement in construction
Reducing the impact of infrastructure projects on the environment remains a key focus for the sector. In a bid to tackle this issue a research project has been launched to examine how sustainable procurement can become part of the construction process.
Sustainability assessment scheme are commonplace in the building sector today to ensure construction projects hit environmental targets. The project aims to show these types of schemes have the potential to be used in the procurement process for infrastructure projects.
Two year project
The project ‘Implementation of Procurement Requirements for Sustainable Collaboration in Infrastructure (Impres)’ will run for two years and will be co-funded by the Construction Climate Challenge (CCC) initiative and the Swedish research council Formas through the ProcSIBE project. The research will also be jointly performed by the project partners Swedish Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), Lund University, WSP Group and Skanska.
It is hoped the project can contribute to more efficient implementation of sustainable procurement in order to reduce the climate impact of the global infrastructure sector. It will focus specifically on procurement requirements and the role of international systems for sustainability assessment.
Research Coordinator for the project and Professor at the Swedish Royal Institute of Technology Anna Kadefors said: “It is easy to formulate and state high requirements in the procurement phase, but there is a problem that they are not always fulfilled in practice and that the follow-up is lacking.”
Kadefors added: “We will perform case studies on infrastructure projects that have implemented requirements for reduced climate impact in four different countries across the world and look at how they set procurement requirements, how they are implemented and followed up.”
It aims to complete with a practical list of recommendations and guidelines that can be used by the industry to support sustainable procurement within construction projects.
Procurement needs to become sustainable
Stefan Uppenberg, Sustainability Consultant at WSP Group and Project Manager for the Impres project said: “We want to take one step further towards creating a common understanding throughout the value chain of how procurement requirements are and can be used for driving the infrastructure sector towards sustainable development.”
He added the project could also see costs reduced for the industry. “More companies and actors see that if we are more efficient in the way we work for saving resources and climate, we also save money,” said Uppenberg.
For further information please visit http://constructionclimatechallenge.com or contact info@constructionclimatechallenge.com.
Watch the film about the research project here:
